Forum Discussion
rlw999 wrote:
Gdetrailer wrote:
One of the pictures does show the backside of the circuit board, it is using a simple resistor current limiting setup which severely limits the voltage range.
I see 16 transistors on the board (can't make out the part number in the picture, but they are labeled Q1-Q16 and each has 3 terminals, so I'm assuming they are transistors). So they almost certainly have constant current drivers for the LED's that will likely work well over typical 12V charging system voltage levels.
Transistors and resistors perhaps, but no switching constant current regulator what so ever. You can make a simple series pass "regulator" with a handful of resistors and one transistor but a series pass regulator is very inefficient, wastes a lot of energy as heat and unless you throw in something like a zener diode for creating a rock solid reference voltage that series pass regulator will eventually pass more and more voltage and current..
Those also could be linear 3 lead regulators but that also would be pretty wasteful as they are the same as a linear series pass transistor regulator just without the need for external parts support.. But three lead linear regulators with proper design should be noise decoupled with capacitors on input and output leads which I don't see..
Switching constant current regulators will have more than three leads and require more parts support plus RFI filtering (inductor and capacitor filtering) which is not present on those boards..
They are however cheap enough to "experiment" with but as one review mentioned about 14V perhaps a bit more for top voltage.. RV three stage converters typically will have a bulk charge voltage of 14.4V-14.8V, one or tenths of a volt more can mean life or death to poorly designed LED light assemblies. Once LEDs get near the max current, it takes much less voltage variation to burn them out from over current as they will draw more current at an extreme rate.
For the less than $30 for qty of 20, it isn't much risk other than the need to change the LEDs at a faster rate as they may have a shorter usable life..Gdetrailer wrote:
One of the pictures does show the backside of the circuit board, it is using a simple resistor current limiting setup which severely limits the voltage range.
I see 16 transistors on the board (can't make out the part number in the picture, but they are labeled Q1-Q16 and each has 3 terminals, so I'm assuming they are transistors). So they almost certainly have constant current drivers for the LED's that will likely work well over typical 12V charging system voltage levels.- I prefer the warm ones. The brite ones are very white. I have 2 lights in the kitchen area with the super whites. The rest are the warm ones. And the kids still have incandescents in the bunks, the leds were to bright for them. My small TT has way to many lights lol. The pop up has only 2 lights and we needed the natural or super white ones.
- You might not want the brightest.
At some point, it is annoying. d1h wrote:
If I did get these to try I'm really torn on the color to get. Warm white seems like it might give a little more homey atmosphere inside the RV. Natural white might be a little less yellowish. I'm sort of hesitant of getting the super white in fear of giving the appearance of a sterile operating room.
3500K is a pretty decent compromise, not as yellow as 2700K-3000K but not as harsh of a blueish light of 6000K.
The incandescent you are replacing are 2700K or a bit below that..
I know a lot of folks love to get 5000K-6500K but to me it turns everything a harsh bluish light like you get when arc welding and throws a lot of shadows so I shy away from that high of color temps.
In my home, I have found 3500K-4100K pretty comfortable and in my RV I have 3500K LEDs which for myself works great.
For the under $30 for qty of 20, they are inexpensive enough that if you don't like the color, just replace with a different color..- Heck, $1.20/unit? I'll give them a try. I ordered the warm white.
- If I did get these to try I'm really torn on the color to get. Warm white seems like it might give a little more homey atmosphere inside the RV. Natural white might be a little less yellowish. I'm sort of hesitant of getting the super white in fear of giving the appearance of a sterile operating room.
2oldman wrote:
They are very cheap, so beware. The usual problem is cheaper LEDs don't have a wide voltage range tolerance, so when your converter is pumping out 14+ volts they may start flickering and burning out.
I didn't find any voltage spec other than "12v", but one reviewer said 11-14 volts. So you may want to ask about it.
^^^THIS^^^
One of the pictures does show the backside of the circuit board, it is using a simple resistor current limiting setup which severely limits the voltage range.
While you can safely operate LEDs in a undervoltage situation, overvoltage will quickly lead to LED burnouts with this simple current limiting setup.
Dry camping with no converter or solar charging happening you would be "safe", but add in the converter or solar charging and the voltage can rise above 14V since many converters and even solar controllers are designed to deliver 14.4V-15V while charging.
The good part of these ones is they have a bridge rectifier built in which means they are not polarity sensitive so even if the fixture has the pos and neg switched, the LEDs will still light.
Best advice I can give is buy a couple and try it under charging conditions and see what happens..- Couldn't live without LED's now. Even rewired the cooktop fan lights to LED strip lighting.
- They are very cheap, so beware. The usual problem is cheaper LEDs don't have a wide voltage range tolerance, so when your converter is pumping out 14+ volts they may start flickering and burning out.
I didn't find any voltage spec other than "12v", but one reviewer said 11-14 volts. So you may want to ask about it.
